Builders' Forum Archives

Re: Panels fiberglass rea

Posted by Steve Miller on Sep 19, 2004

1. & 2. Drips, heat gun (carefull!!!) or hair dryer, scraper. There should be little sanding on the actual planks after the drips etc are cleaned up.

3. While I have not built the Sass I have built a lapstrake sailboat. Take care in sanding the planks and laps. You do not round over the edges of the planks. You just want the sharpness off, ever so slightly eased but not really rounded at all. It will only take a few light passes with the sand paper.

Do not fair the lapped planks into the boat. You want to see nice squared plank edges. If needed (sight along the boat) take your plane (or sanding board) and set it to cut as fine as you can and run it along the edge of each plank to make it perfectly fair (probably not needed in a CNC router cut kit boat). The plane blade will be set against the edge (end grain) of the plank not the flat side of the plank/boat. (If that does not make sense then post before you try and I'll take a picture & post it.)

I sanded the little fillets inside the lap with the paper over a pc of plastic or rubber tube that was the right size. You can actually buy a set of these. Pretty slick. Check your local wood working store or just go get an assortment of tubing at Home Depot.

You want the fillets smoothed only. Don't try to hollow them out or reduce them. They are structural. Also remember they will be upside down so absolute perfection is not needed but smooth. Its too easy with the dremel to mess them up so I stuck with my tubing. From you photos you are already looking pretty good - nice work!

4. I'd sand now. Then mask off the areas not getting glass. After the glass is on pull the masking and do your sealer coats over the rest of the boat at the same time as you do your fill the glass coats. You will be ready for prep sanding when you are done.